Death rate rising for working-class white Americans

One of the recent (well, sort of recent) news stories that has caught my attention is the rising death rate for middle-aged working-class white Americans.

Quote:

According to the report, an epidemic of drug abuse and despair has killed so many white middle-aged Americans over the past decade, the demographic has actually seen an increase in its mortality rate over the period, even as medical advances decreased the death rate across every other racial and ethnic group.

The spike in mortality was borne entirely by the white working class — the death rate for non-college-educated white men and women, ages 45 to 54, increased by 22 percent between 1999 and 2013, according to the new statistical analysis by the Princeton husband-and-wife economist team Angus Deaton and Anne Case. Prior to 1999, the mortality rate within that group had been falling steadily for decades.

What I found particularly interesting about articles on this story were the frequent comparisons to the increase in the death rate for Russian men following the collapse of the Soviet Union. My own suspicion is that the rise in the death rate for working-class white Americans came about following the implementation of neoliberal economic policies (union busting, outsourcing, cuts to social spending, etc.) in many areas of the country. Many formerly prosperous towns are now pretty much depressed husks. Things in the United States continue to worsen for working people as can be seen by the fact that the suicide rate is now at a 30-year high.